Munitions Empire

Inside the Flame Castle, a maid placed a report on Sofia's desk with utmost respect, bowed her head, and began her report, "Lady Sofia! The envoy from Chu Country has brought us a contract for the purchase of an additional 20,000 Shireck Model 1 rifles. We've achieved good sales results in many regions of Dahua."

A bit irritated, Sofia waved her hand dismissively and casually instructed, "Leave it there, I'm aware."

After giving her instructions, she turned back to the engineers who were reporting to her. The engineers' faces were full of dejection, for they had failed to complete their work.

For more than a year, they had been desperately trying to expand and develop the various technologies from the Great Tang Group.

The Shireck Consortium had not remained idle; after acquiring the respective technologies from the Great Tang Group, they had launched their own research.

Some of these research efforts yielded certain results, while others were still at a standstill, with even the basic principles not understood.

One of the leaders in charge of the engineers clasped his hands together and, with an apologetic look towards Sofia, continued, "The more we compare, the more we realize the enormous technological gap between us and the Great Tang Group, and the result is indeed very frustrating."

As he spoke, he shook his head and delivered an answer that further irritated Sofia, "In material science, manufacturing processes, product design, and so on... we're completely behind in every aspect, we don't even have the ability to catch up."

This wasn't the first time Sofia had heard such an answer. She had almost always received similar responses after acquiring some technology that the Great Tang Group had deigned to give her.

No one wants to constantly hear such disheartening results from their subordinates, and the scientific researchers of Shireck didn't even have a solid foundation in basic theory.
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To Sofia's despair, it was the teams led by the young technicians and engineers trained by the Great Tang Group that were more creative. Many of the technical breakthroughs were now being made by these groups.

However, Sofia certainly dared not let these technicians, who came from the Great Tang Group, truly access Shireck's core; the idea of dancing naked in front of the other party made her extremely uncomfortable.

"The gap... just how big is it?" she looked towards another project leader on the opposite side and asked slowly.

The response from another leader was even more pessimistic; after contemplating, he replied, "How big is the gap between us? It's unimaginably vast! I'm still struggling to learn the new terminologies they've created!"

This statement struck a chord with Sofia because she, too, was trying hard to grasp many completely new terminologies that had never appeared before.

These new terms represented the most advanced products, as well as the most cutting-edge technologies! For example, the internal combustion engine was a new concept that Sofia had only recently come across in a telegram dispatched from Brunas.

The Great Tang Group was using this terminology to name an entire class of power systems, while also popularizing more efficient fertilizers to increase agricultural productivity.

Newly formulated compound fertilizers had better effects on most soils than simple phosphate or nitrogen fertilizers alone, which was fundamentally why the Tang Kingdom dared to accommodate such a large population on a massive scale.

In terms of farming technology, the Tang Kingdom was clearly ahead of the world; the farming technologies and fertilizer production techniques of the Great Tang Group were supporting the explosive growth of the Tang Kingdom's population.

But the concept of fertilizer that Sofia had previously understood was mostly animal and human excrement, which was filthy and something she was reluctant to even mention.

Only to hear that leader continue, he elaborated on the matter of new terminologies he had mentioned, "Yes, you heard it right, new terminologies! Not just new technologies! As soon as they introduce a new technology, the terms used to describe it are entirely foreign to our technical staff."

Spreading his hands in a gesture of helplessness, he regretfully gave an example, "We just learned and deciphered their new technology to produce a steel formula that can be used in rifling barrels, and they have already replaced it with newer products."

Then he continued to detail just how vast the difference was between them, "While our technical workers are still trying to figure out how to minimize impurities in steel products, the steelmaking departments of the Great Tang Group are already deliberately adding a variety of materials to improve certain properties."

The shock absorbers in Shireck's Gobur cars were just springs, while the Great Tang Group's car springs had performances better suited to the cars they were designed for.

Their springs could be made corrosion-resistant, harder, providing better support for the vehicles, and endowing the cars with superior off-road capabilities.

As for Shireck's car springs, they could only rely on the workers' adjustments to achieve the desired shock absorption strength; as for corrosion resistance and other performance aspects, they were left to fate. Regarding service life, Shireck generally achieved barely satisfactory standards by increasing the thickness of the spring steel plates.

This resulted in Shireck's Gobur cars being quite heavy, with mediocre performance and somewhat fuel-inefficient... Although the difference may not seem significant on the surface, over time, a very clear technological gap becomes evident.